Ray Consulo
History Ray Consulo was born 2382 AD aboard the Ceres Colony to parents Milliardo Consulo and his wife, Clare Bombardi. Ray spent most of his childhood enjoying the peaceful era after the ELS War and occasionally assisted his parents in the development of the fledgling Ceres Colony, which had only just begun construction. During this time he learned a limited knowledge of mechanics and engineering. He learned mobile suit piloting simply from watching his father and through simulator runs, giving him a basic piloting skill. At age 16 Ray had decided to join the Research Expedition lead by the Earth Sphere Federation. Because of his age he was given a limited role but nevertheless he thrived under his new role, constantly seeking new knowledge and rediscovering history. Ray's favorite subject of study was Celestial Being and it's shadow organizations, having collected a surprisngly vast level of knowledge about them. This knowledge later proved valuable to the ESF as the War against The Ascent forced the previously pacifistic government into need of mobile suits suited for war instead of merely construction. It was Ray who suggested the Research Expedition begin searching for any technology left behind by CB that could prove valuable. During one such expedition into the Mars Asteroid Belt the transport used by Ray's group was ambushed by Ascent Forces, who believed the ship to be a disguised scouting ship. Clearly outmatched in both numbers and firepower, the group was forced to flee. Unfortunatly The Ascent wasn't going to let them escape and managed to cripple the transport in their pursuit, critically damaging it's GN Drive and sending the craft crashing into one of the many asteroids in orbit. Ray and the ship's captain, Donovan, barely managed to evacuate everyone in time before the ship's drive overloaded, taking most of the ship with it. Unknown to either side the asteroid was in fact a hidden colony previously used by Celestial Being shadow organization, Star Strike. The explosion of the drive was enough to punch a hole into the defenses left behind, giving the expedition group a place of temporary sanctuary. After determining that The Ascent wouldn't be able to penetrate the defenses of the colony any time soon, and restoring full power to the facility, Donovan ordered Ray to form a group and scout the facility for anything that could be of use to protect themselves. Excited for the opportunity to study a formerly unknown branch of Celestial Being, Ray quickly set out to learn as much as he could about the colony. During his search, Ray stumbled upon a hanger that had been previously sealed off until power had been restored and discovered the GNSS-TD-3 Perfect Guardian, and the remaining Legacy Mobile Suits stored within. After several failed attempts to activate the mobile suits, Ray reluctantly reported his findings and moved on to continue his search. Ray's continued search would provide even greater results, as his group discovered a Haro Management Center in which an army of Haro's constantly worked to keep the facility intact. Several of the Haro's became alerted to Ray's group and believing they were members of Star Strike demanded they activate "Star Strike's Emergency Plan", giving him precise coordinates on where to find it. The coordinates led Ray to a chamber containing the sleeping bodies of Gundam Meister Ransac Strike, Longshot, Chief Engineer Syrene Gaze, Daryl, and Jim. The discovery of gundam meisters that still lived excited Ray, who believed he had found the means to end the war and to protect the colony. Unfortunatly his joy was cut short as The Ascent finally managed to make progress with the defenses of the colony and their continued assault was beginning to destablize the main power generator. One Ascent warship managed to land a critical shot that sent the entire colony into a code red situation, spurring the Haro Command to begin systematically unlocking the colony. The attack was also damaged the Cold Sleep Containment Pods, activating the emergency override protocols that began the procedure to awaken the pilots. During this time Ray and his group had fled to a newly activated second hanger, in which Donovan had discovered The Traveller lying dormant. By the time Ray had arrived, most of the expedition group, as well as the entire colony's worth of Haro's had flooded into the ship. Unfortunatly the ship couldn't be activated as neither the crew nor the Haros knew the access codes for launch. It was at this time that the Haro's reported activation of the Gundam. Ransac, having been the first to wake up and quickly realizing the sitation, had launched in the Perfect Guardian and immediatly sortied against The Ascent. Despite initial difficulties in dealing with the decades more advanced mobile suits, the gundam managed to eliminate the enemy one by one, slowly opening a path for The Traveller to escape through. Ransac was quickly joined by Longshot in his Legacy and the two continued to carve open a path. Despite this, The Traveller had yet to be activated. The expedition group became desperate as the main generator was reaching critical. Fortunatly for both the pilots and the expedition, Daryl, Syrene, and Jim had arrived to take control of the ship, and after some argument between Daryl and Donovan, managed to get the ship operating in time to escape the colony's destruction and send the Ascent fleeing. After the battle the expedition became the crew of The Traveller and befriended their rescuers. After debate over the next course of action Ray suggested the ship meet up with his father at the moon. During this time Ray became determined to become a mobile suit pilot and began training under Ransac's guidance. On their way to the moon, Ray attempted to learn about the ship and it's original crew's past. He also secretly wondered why Ransac resembled his father so closely, unknowing that Milliardo was in fact a genetic clone. Eventually the crew arrived at the moon and Ray lead the pilots to meet his father. Milliardo was at first relieved to see his son safe and was about to thank them until he saw Ransac. Immediatly the two drew their guns at each other and began a stand off in which each demanded how the other still lived. To make matters even worse, Ransac had glimpsed Clare Bombardi, who upon hearing the commotion had entered to see what was going on. Upon seeing Ransac she fled the room, sparking a full pursuit by the enraged Gundam Pilot. While both groups were caught up in the pursuit, expedition member Reginald used the opportunity to sabotage the colony's power generator. Meanwhile, Ransac had managed to corner Clare and after a heated fight between the two ultimately decided to forgive her for her betrayal for both Ray and Milliardo's sakes. Unfortunatly at that moment the main generator overloaded and the resulting explosion took Clare's life after emergency protocols locked her inside one of the sections being sealed off to prevent the damage from spreading. Ray arrived in time to see his mother killed. Horrified at Ransac for what he believed he had done, Ray lashed out and nearly managed to kill the Super Innovator before being stopped by Milliardo. Further infuriated that his own father would forgive Ransac, and after further manipulation by Reginald, Ray fled the colony. The final straw for him was Milliardo rescuing Ransac from the wreckage of the Perfect Guardian. This pushed him to forsake his own father and sparked what would become a powerful drive for vengance. To this end Ray joined a shadow group of the Earth Sphere Federation. By the time The Traveller was heading back to Earth after the Battle of Ceres, all of his hard work pulled off and Ray was given command of the RX-02 Wraith Gundam, a powerful mobile suit constructed using the data and technology taken from mobile suits that had mysteriously entered their reality. Quotes *"You don't like how I fight? Then learn how to so I don't have to do it for you!" Trivia *Ray Consulo was one of the original ideas for the original plot designed for the War of the Ascent era, but was shuffled out after Mobile Suit Gundam 00S: Crossover began.